Computer programmers spend large amounts of time editing and debugging computer programs as part of the process by which the programs are created and optimized. In a textual language environment the editing and debugging process requires the computer programmer to look at many lines of code. It can frequently be difficult to pick out important sections of code from all of the code surrounding the section of code that is of interest to the programmer. As a result, textual editors and debuggers often include features which highlight or otherwise visually identify semantically sensitive syntax that has meaning to the programmer.
In a graphical language environment, a graphical model is displayed which includes many graphical elements with interspersed textual elements. Some of the textual elements are labels for various components, while other textual elements represent items with intrinsic executable computational meaning that is related to the text and is of interest to the programmer attempting to edit or optimize the model. Unfortunately, conventional graphical language environments fail to provide an automated mechanism for providing an indicator for textual elements which have intrinsic executable computational meaning within a displayed graphical model where the indicator is based upon a characteristic of the identified textual item.